Ice cream-inspired rocky road parfaits

Patricia Conte has a background in marketing communications and works as an independent writer. In 2010, she was given the opportunity to combine her love of writing and food when she started as a contributing writer for the Food channel...

Get ready for Rocky Road!

A classic ice cream flavor takes a twist for an easy, summer-inspired dessert!

Ice cream is a favorite treat during the hot summer months. We've taken some inspiration from a popular ice cream flavor to put together these easy-to-make rocky road parfaits — a dessert you can serve any time of year!

Since it's bathing suit season, you can reduce the calories in this recipe and still get the same mouthwatering, sweet results: Use nonfat milk to mix with the pudding, nonfat whipped topping, and you could even use prepackaged, sugar-free pudding for the layers.

Ice cream-inspired rocky road parfait recipe

Serves 4-6

Ingredients:

1 (5.9-ounce) box of chocolate instant pudding mix

3 cups milk

1 (8-ounce) container whipped topping, thawed

4-6 tablespoons marshmallow topping

1/8 cup salted peanuts, chopped, as garnish*

Chocolate chips or chocolate shavings as garnish

Directions:

Tip: You’ll need more peanuts, but if you'd like, add a thin layer of peanuts between one or more of the layers.

Whisk together the chocolate pudding mix with the milk until well blended. Refrigerate for about 5 minutes until the pudding is set.

After the pudding has set, spoon half the mix into a separate bowl.

Fold 1/2 cup of the whipped topping into one of the bowls of pudding. Mix until the two are combined.

Use the two pudding mixtures and the remaining whipped topping to create the layers of your parfaits. For each serving, spoon one layer of pudding into a clear dessert cup or bowl, followed by a layer of the other pudding or the whipped topping. You can vary the amounts for each layer, and alternate the colors, but make sure to use pudding as your final layer.

Dollop a tablespoon of marshmallow topping over each serving, and garnish with the chopped peanuts and bits of chocolate.